Joe Lewis and Daniel Levy, the major shareholders in Tottenham Hotspur's parent company, Enic, are likely to be forced to commit more than £100m of their own cash in order to build the club's new stadium. That sum will fuel speculation that once full planning permission is achieved, the pair will instead cash in and sell the club.

A recent rights issue, which saw 30 million new shares placed on 21 August, raised £15m in cash for the club, a sum that will offset planning-application costs on Spurs' new 60,000-seat facility without impacting on transfer budgets. Enic underwrote the issue, with less than 7.5% of the new shares bought by third parties.

That meant Lewis and Levy had to pump in £13.9m of their own money, but it was by no means a bad deal for them. The rights issue was heavily discounted: shares were offered at 50p each, down from the market price of more than 80p. Now Enic's holding in Spurs has increased by more than 2% to almost three-quarters of the shares in issue.

Although a cost assessment of the stadium has yet to be conducted, it is expected to come in at more than £250m. Enic envisages a cash-raising exercise that will offer debentures to fans in return for season-ticket rights while generating funds from debt markets, all underpinned with a fresh share issue.

But having tested the market's appetite last month, Lewis and Levy know that would personally cost them huge sums. Far more profitable would be to sell their shares on the inevitable surge in price that will come when planning permission for the ground is achieved. If that happens, the 27.8m shares they picked up last month at 50p a pop would look fantastic value.

Sauber's secret suitors

As BMW sold its stake in Sauber to Qadbak Investments yesterday, it might have had implications for the Football League. The League is still trying to establish who is behind Qadbak, the parent of Munto Finance, which in turn owns Notts County and whose ownership of the club has yet to receive fit-and-proper-persons-test approvals. But there were no clues in BMW's statement yesterday, which introduced Qadbak nebulously as "a Swiss-based foundation which represents the interests of certain Middle East- and European-based families". The League will continue to ask Qadbak who Qadbak is, in the hope it proves more cooperative than hitherto.

Greyhound gang muzzled

Ian Taylor, the gold-medal-winning hockey goalkeeper at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, has left his office as the chief executive of the Greyhound Board of Great Britain. Following a meeting on Monday led by the former Manchester United director and GBGB chairman, Maurice Watkins, a terse, one-line statement was issued announcing Taylor's "resignation" without so much as a thank you for his 13 months' service. But it appears there is more to the situation than meets the eye, with non-disclosure agreements seemingly in place. Requests for clarification as to the circumstances of his departure, at a time of high controversy over the GBGB's anti-doping practices, were stonewalled by the organisation over "legal constraints".

Amos fate unknown

Sebastian Coe, below, and Sir Keith Mills appear to hold the key as to whether Valerie Amos, Coe's fellow peer, remains on the England 2018 World Cup bid board. The pair are believed to have been minded to replace her when she moves to Australia to become its high commissioner next month. But after yesterday's England 2018 meeting the board deferred the decision until it reconvenes, also next month.

Reds' bizarre boast

Given the furore over Chelsea's engagement of Gaël Kakuta and the allegations of similar practices at other English clubs, it might seem politic not to draw too much attention to our leagues' youth-recruitment practices. Not so in the eyes of Liverpool, though, whose official website slavers with undisguised glee about how Premier League clubs exploit loopholes in employment laws around Europe. Speaking about the reserve forward signed in 2007, Daniel Pacheco, the Merseyside club still states: "With youngsters in Spain unable to sign professional contracts until the age of 18, [several Barcelona] starlets have been snapped up by English clubs." Michel Platini would be delighted.